WASHINGTON -- Almost four months after his presidential election defeat, Mitt Romney is planning a return to the national political stage. The 2012 Republican nominee will appear, with his wife Ann, on Fox News Sunday next weekend, Chris Wallace, the program's host, announced Sunday. It will be his first televised interview since the November election. Romney also plans to speak next month at the Conservative Political Action Conference, a high-profile forum for conservative politicians.

OXON HILL, Md.--Returning to a public stage for the first time since losing the presidential election, Mitt Romney called on Republicans Friday to put a powerful U.S. military at the top of their agenda. The 2012 Republican nominee had a distrustful relationship with some conservatives during his presidential run, but he was warmly received by hundreds of activists at the Conservative Political Action Conference, the annual meeting of activists from that wing of the party. Romney's call echoed his 2012 campaign promise to expand the Pentagon budget.

It came as no surprise to anyone who had been paying attention that Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul won the presidential straw poll at last weekend's annual Conservative Political Action Conference near Washington, D.C. The CPAC crowd is dominated by younger male conservatives, the constituency who flocked to the doomed presidential campaign of Paul's father, now-retired Texas Rep. Ron Paul. But the speech that Paul gave on the afternoon of second day should really be heard by all Americans, Democrats and Republicans alike.

WASHINGTON - With his standing among the conservative base still hobbled by his support for immigration reform, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has settled on a new course, staking his claim as a leader of the Republican Party's wonk wing. The latest example came in a speech Monday on how to boost America's economic growth, in which Rubio argued that Washington needs new thinking to meet the challenges of a new economic age. "As much as we innovate now, we could be doing even more," Rubio said at a forum hosted by the Jack Kemp Foundation at Google's Washington headquarters.

The Donald Trump-moderated debate planned for Iowa at month's end may be missing one key ingredient: candidates. Mitt Romney on Tuesday added his name to the list of Republican presidential hopefuls who are deciding against sharing a stage with the brash media mogul, saying his schedule was just too tight. "No, I'm not participating in that," Romney said in yet another appearance on Fox News Channel on Tuesday. "I spoke with Donald Trump earlier today and indicated we just can't make it. " How did the Donald react?

OXON HILL, Md.--For the second year in a row, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky won the presidential straw poll at the annual gathering of conservatives known as CPAC -- this year leading his closest rival by 20 points. The results were announced Saturday night as 2008 vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin closed out the Conservative Political Action Conference by arguing that an American "awakening" had begun due to the botched rollout of the President's healthcare law and what she called his "dopey wobbling on the world stage.

Rick Perry made no mention of Mitt Romney, the current delegate leader in the GOP nomination fight, in his remarks to CPAC attendees Thursday afternoon. Nor did he express further support for the man he endorsed for president after ending his own bid -- Newt Gingrich. But the Texas governor did give voice to the conservative activists who have yet to coalesce around a single candidate by imploring like-minded Republicans not to "settle" in the presidential race. "We do the American people no great service if we replace the current embodiment of big government with a lukewarm version of the same," Perry said.

Rick Santorum, still enjoying a surge in fundraising and attention after winning three states last week in the battle for the Republican presidential nomination, pushed back Sunday against the idea that his socially conservative views could alienate working women. Many pundits have suggested that Santorum's views on gay marriage, abortion, contraception and working women could present formidable obstacles in attracting moderate and independent voters if he were to become the GOP nominee.

March 10, 2014 | By Maeve Reston, A clarification has been added to this post. See the note below for details.

WASHINGTON -- The rallying cry at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference here last week was that President Obama had failed to show strength on foreign policy, but a new CNN poll found that even among Republicans, few support U.S. military involvement -- or even military assistance -- in the Ukraine crisis. A plurality of respondents (48%) approved of Obama's handling of the situation in Ukraine, the poll found. That figure was higher than the president's overall job-approval rating, which has hovered in the low 40s. Russia has sent troops into the Crimean peninsula and encouraged what Obama has called an “illegal” referendum on March 16 that is to decide whether Crimea secedes from Ukraine to become part of Russia.